Wine and Flowers
A/N: I was sad there wasn't anything on Ao3 for this ship, so I whipped something up! :
And can I make a MP100 fic not based on a book quote? It doesn't seem so.
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"All gods who receive homage are cruel. All gods dispense suffering without reason. Otherwise they would not be worshipped. Through indiscriminate suffering men know fear and fear is the most divine emotion. It is the stones for altars and the beginning of wisdom. Half gods are worshipped in wine and flowers. Real gods require blood."
(-Zora Neale Hurston, 'Their Eyes Were Watching God')
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"You are not a god, Shinji."
He didn't move—not even to react to the informal usage of his first name. Tokugawa shifted the compress on his bruised eye, twisting around in that ever graceful way of his to collect a cotton ball. Kamuro's nose was starting to bleed again, and he cleaned it with care as it reached his lips.
"… I know."
Speaking felt like he was coughing up thumbtacks. His voice crackled out of him in the most shameful manner. Not befitting of a president at all.
Tokugawa did not reply. The weight of an explanation rested with Kamuro, and that made him feel small and sick.
"I… I just wanted to be popular."
He almost hiccupped from the bitter taste of tears in his throat, and his fingers clutched desperately to the side of the bathtub. Tokugawa did not falter, his hold on the compress ever firm and his fingers still delicately tending to blood.
"I wanted to be in control," Kamuro had to pull fishing ropes from deep within to understand his own evil intentions, and the resulting feelings poured out with the words. "I wanted to feel like I could be something. I cannot do anything spectacular, I don't have any special skills, while my brother— "
"You should not build an altar to the unattainable."
It was the first and only time Tokugawa cut him off. If he thought much of the dethroning, he did not show it, his dry persona Kamuro could at times appreciate dominating any subtle display of emotion. He pressed a little too harshly at Kamuro's injured nose—not enough to be cruel and make him cry out, but enough to cement his attention.
"You should not try to be like your brother," he began, not so much condescending as compassionate. "You will never be like him. You are yourself, and only that. You should not create an army and forsake your nature to go after dreams of an impossibility. Acting like a god will not make you one."
Kamuro's fingernails squeaked against the bathtub. He tasted blood along his lips and wanted to throw up, or cry, he was not sure which. He could not allow Tokugawa to see the utter weakness of either, although he probably knew how Kamuro was feeling anyway. He usually did.
"Haruto, I don't want to do this anymore," Kamuro managed to speak over his dangerous emotions. "I'm done."
"It took until you were hurt yourself to realize that," Tokugawa reminded him quite pointedly. "You harmed others, senselessly, and you liked the taste of blood until it was your own. To disperse suffering without reason is the mystery of a god, and you are a man."
Tokugawa lifted Kamuro's head with the side of his hand to meet their gaze. The slightest waver of gentleness held Tokugawa's eyes, but he was still firm, and his tone mixed the two.
"It must be terrible, to walk among the flowers and know the bitter taste of wine."
Kamuro stared a moment longer. Then, he laughed, in pain and not in joy, the picture complete with the earthly red blood coloring his lips.
"I burned my flowers and grape vines long ago."
Tokugawa removed the warmed compress from Kamuro's eye. He folded it up neatly and rested his hands in his lap, viewing them thoughtfully.
"It is good they can grow back, then," he said. "You can change. You can strive for dreams that will not banish you from heaven and forget you in deserts."
The knot of tears crawled up Kamuro's throat. He shook his head and hid his wounded face in his hands. Little noises of sorrow and weeping passed his buffer, and Tokugawa brushed his hand over Kamuro's unkempt hair.
Maybe he could change.
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A/N: And then they kiss n stuff.
Tokugawa has no given first name, so I dubbed him Haruto!